Edmonton-Whitemud was the longtime riding of former PC cabinet minister and premier Dave Hancock.

Mandel successfully leveraged his name recognition as the former mayor of Edmonton, but it wasn't an easy campaign.

He dealt with public anger over lack of care beds for seniors, bottlenecks in emergency wards, and cancelled surgeries.

He told supporters he will continue the work he has started as health minister.

"Working with doctors, nurses, pharmacists, people in the industry, will allow us to find out the answers," said Mandel, 69. "Not answers from the top, but answers from working with people. That's what will make the difference in the coming months."

Hancock took Edmonton-Whitemud with 60 per cent of the votes in the 2012 general election. Mandel bristled when asked if he was concerned that his 42 per cent was a message from voters.

"This is a byelection and byelections are usually much more difficult and I think we did remarkably well," he said. "We got over 42 per cent of the vote, so, I'm not — silly question."

In Calgary-West, the Wildrose party had high hopes for Taylor, a former trustee and chair of the Calgary Board of Education. The former oil executive resigned her seat with the board earlier this month when she signed up to run.

She attacked Dirks on the modular classroom issue after her loss.

"What we saw from Mr. Dirks just in the last week was a case where he put his own personal interest ahead of the interests of Calgary students," she said.

The byelection outcomes don't have the potential to change the balance of power.

With the four byelections wins the Tories hold 61 seats in the 87-seat legislature — the same number they won in the last general election in April 2012.

The Wildrose have 17 seats, the Liberals five and the NDP four.

A general election is mandated by law to be held in the spring of 2016.

— With files from Bill Graveland and Lauren Krugel in Calgary and Rob Drinkwater in Edmonton.